I have noticed when I put my fly predators out in the pasture near the manure and also in the barn aisle and corners of stalls that in no time there are ants crawling all over the fly predator pile. I can only imagine they are eating the newly hatched predators and therefore are making it impossible for them to do their job. Has anyone had this issue? I thought about switching to Simplifly, but we use our aged manure for the garden and don’t want the pesticide getting into our veggies. There has to be a solution! We keep our manure pile about 500 yards away from the barn.
Put them out in a dish that’s sitting inside a feed pan filled with water? They can fly away as they hatch. Ants won’t be able to cross a water moat.
4 Likes
During the several years I use fly predators, I put them out at twilight, to help save them from birds (which would otherwise pick them off). Would that do the same in regards to ants?
Water might work, but many ants build bridges over water obstacles using their own bodies - including fire ants.
Since we have chickens we put our predators out in a bucket, hung just under the barn eave, closest to the manure pile. This technique was recommended to us by Spalding.
Would this work for the ants or would this just climb up and get them?
Do you use any ant control products? Fire ants are really a problem here in the deep south. I use Extinguish Pro, which is an insect growth regulator bait. It controls fire ants and other types, is safe for horses on actively grazed pastures, and will have no effect on the fly predators.
it looks and smells like crushed corn chips, spreading rate is about 2 pounds per acre, and it is almost completely transported by the worker ants underground to feed to their larvae within an hour of being broadcast. It is not a poison. It prevents larvae from maturing to workers and the queens die of starvation, and even the beds you cannot see to spot treat are controlled.
I don’t think it would harm chickens. Anyway the spreading rate is so minimal there is very little of it on the ground to be ingested,
1 Like
I wouldn’t bother putting them in the barn or stalls, there shouldn’t be manure there anyway 
Put them out in the pasture, on manure piles, around dusk so you avoid scavenging birds.
I’m pretty sure 500 yards is much too far for the predators to fly, so they should be used much closer to the manure pile anyway
Darn, no one told my horses.
All summer they like to use their stalls as a litter box. Go in and manure and pee every night. Let the humans buy expensive bedding to keep things tidy.
(I do not put predators in my stalls, I am simply stating there is manure there for 12 hour periods.)
LOL! I meant, there shouldn’t be manure in stalls that hang out there for any real length of time, to warrant the use of predators there
I don’t use predators anymore since I’m the only person who does with neighbors that have a pile of cows & goats. Fire ants were eating my predators so I called Spaulding. They gave me quite a few suggestions. Hang them in a tree slightly off the ground, not too high & paint the trunk with something from Arbico Organics that will deter the ants. Use Amdro fire ant bait a few days before releasing predators. I still use the bait because it gets rid of them fast. The lady suggestion was to put them in a bowl floating in water.
1 Like
